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The chime on Cora Randall’s cell phone was not, as she’d assumed, an indication that it was time to take the single-serving lasagna dinner from the oven. When she opened the oven itself, she found a still half-frozen slab of vegetarian lasagna, something Victor would have referred to as “rabbit food.” It was a curse, knowing that he’d been taken from this world due to a bad heart. If only she’d forced a little more rabbit food here and there. If only she’d swapped roast beef for Brussels sprouts. If only.
She soon learned that the chime just then was an alert for an email. This was a surprise. Cora hardly received emails these days, especially as she’d decided to retire from her career at the high school after her husband’s death. Everyone had told her to hang onto her job— that it would keep her going day after day. But to Cora, it had seemed meaningless, performing the rituals of an ordinary life while her insides bungled themselves up with the weight of her depression. Besides, who wanted to spend more time with high schoolers than they had to?
The email was from Greta Collins, the director of community theater productions for the previous twelve years. Over a week ago, it had been announced that Greta had been injured, destroyed her foot, and wouldn’t be able to perform her duties as a director any longer. This, to Cora, seemed in line with the rest of her world, as everything had shifted off its axis. Why should she have musical theater back? It wouldn’t have felt right without Victor by her side on-stage, anyway.
Cora opened the email prepared for an update on Greta’s health. But what she found instead was rather surprising.
Dear Thespians of Martha’s Vineyard,
It pleases me to write this email. I’ve just had a bout of good luck. Call it serendipity. Call it fate. Call it whatever you want! But I’ve found the stand-in community director for this year’s production of Annie— and she’s completely perfect for the gig.
Lola Sheridan is the youngest daughter of Wes and Anna Sheridan (of the Sunrise Cove Inn). At thirty-eight, she returned to our beautiful island after twenty years away. She’s a renowned journalist, a killer dresser, and a seasoned thespian herself.
Therefore, auditions will go on as originally planned, throughout the afternoon and evening of Friday, January 7th, beginning at 4 p.m. sharp.
Again, it is a real tragedy for me to miss out on this truly spectacular role as your director. Know that I will be there in the audience rooting for you throughout the final weekend of February and that, God willing, I will be back in the director’s chair come autumn, when we’re slated to put on, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf.
All my love to you, my thespians. And break a leg at auditions! Not a foot, like I did.
Greta
Cora reread the email twice more, positioned her phone back on the countertop, and headed for the study. Once seated at the computer Victor had purchased for them seven years previous, she sought out the Sunrise Cove Inn’s website to read about the family history of the old place. Back when Cora had been in her late twenties, she’d heard the wretched story of Anna Sheridan’s death— a boat accident off the coast of Edgartown. She’d left three girls behind. Here, on the website, Cora now read about those three adult women, who all helped out at the Sunrise Cove Inn alongside their chosen careers. The description featured a photograph of the three women alongside their father, Wes Sheridan, who was now in his seventies. He was still handsome, proud, with his chin lifted high as his cerulean eyes caught the sunlight that beamed over them as if blessing them.
All those years ago, he’d lost his wife in a tragedy—the love of his life.
Unlike Cora, however, he had proof of their love with his gorgeous daughters and, it seemed, a number of grandchildren.
There was no way Cora would audition for this silly musical, right? Her daily schedule suited her just fine. She saw the occasional friend, did the crossword every afternoon, always had a book going, and had a number of TV shows scattered throughout the week. This, she’d found after Victor’s death, was a surprising way to keep her expectations up. As long as she made it to Thursday, she could piece together the missing links left over from the crime show the week before. As long as she made it to Saturday, she could watch the black-and-white movie marathon, which highlighted films she hadn’t seen since she’d been a little girl. At fifty-seven, it felt remarkable to face old age, with such a textured life behind her. So many people had passed away. So much had come and gone.
“You’re a star, kid.” This was what Victor had said after each performance— no matter the audience. He’d said it after their performances at the Oak Bluffs auditorium. He’d said it after she sang her solo in the church choir. He’d said it after she’d retreated from singing in the shower.
“Your gift is your voice. And you should be sharing it with the world.” This was what her mother had told her when she’d been a little girl, auditioning for the elementary school play.
Cora received a phone call from her neighbor, a woman named Henrietta. Henrietta often checked in on Cora as though Cora was an invalid who needed word from the outside. Cora had grown to resent these phone calls, but if she resisted them, Henrietta usually took it upon herself to just come over instead— usually with a bottle of wine and some banana bread. Cora found it difficult to get her out of her house once she came in. She was like bed bugs.
“Hi there, Cora. I was just thinking about you. I made all these lemon bars and thought to myself, who might want these? And I thought of you.”
Cora’s throat tightened. She had to avoid human contact with this woman at all costs. She stuttered and said, “Oh, I don’t know about that. Don’t you want to give them to your grandchildren?”
“Nonsense. They get enough sugar as it is. I’ve told you how I feel about their mother. She feeds them nothing but those packaged meals— the over-processed nonsense.”
“Mmmhmm.” Cora’s eyes widened.
“I heard a rumor that the theater production won’t go ahead this year,” Henrietta continued. “It broke my heart to know that we wouldn’t be able to see your lovely presence on stage, but then I said to myself, isn’t that a blessing in a way? How I love to sit at your house and while away the time with you. Retirement isn’t so bad when you have people to share it with.”
Cora found it terribly difficult to breathe. She closed her eyes and reached for Victor’s old pipe, which she’d had cleaned and positioned just to the left of the computer. It was beautifully carved, mahogany wood; her finger could sense the countless times he’d lifted the pipe to his lips, drawing it and then puffing out smoke. It was heavy with the past.
She could half-believe that he was on his way to retrieve it from the study, to tease her about how she’d insisted he stop smoking the thing in the house.
Just let him walk down the hallway to tease her.
Just let him come in and say anything at all.
“Stop chatting to Henrietta if you don’t want to. Nobody put a gun to your head.”
“Your life is your own, Cora. Nobody’s going to live it for you.”
“Is this how you want to spend your life, Cora? Waiting around for me to come back? That’s not the woman I married.”
“Actually,” Cora heard herself blurt out, “they’ve just found a stand-in for the director. The youngest Sheridan girl will be covering for Greta.”
“Oh! Lola Sheridan. Is that so? You know, she lives with that man who is always sailing his boat, and I don’t think they’re married,” Henrietta continued. “Such a strange sinful life, the sailor’s life. I can’t imagine that Lola girl was up to much good when she left the island, either.”
“I can’t speak to her actions, Henrietta,” Cora returned dryly. “All I know is that I have to prepare the best piece for my audition if she’s going to cast me as anything at all.”
Cora leaped off the phone call just as the oven beeped, alerting her to take out the vegetarian lasagna. Although the ice had melted off and the noodles had softened, it still looked like slops in a pig trough. Prior to Victor’s death, Cora had constructed elaborate and beautiful meals, soufflés and homemade pasta and even self-rolled sushi. What had happened to her? Would she really cease all signs of life?
Would she really live for the Thursday evening crime shows and the black-and-white movie marathons and the afternoon crosswords? Was that what Cora Randall was all about?
Cora returned to the study to print out sheet music from the musical Annie. At the age of fifty-seven, Cora knew herself to be perfect for one incredibly important and juicy role within the musical itself. Miss Hannigan was the greedy and monstrous leader of the orphanage. She was a woman whose mega eye rolls could be witnessed from the furthest seat away in the auditorium. Her gut-busting solos were the stuff of legends. And what’s more, it sounded silly and quite fun to work alongside little “orphan girls” at the orphanage, especially because, well—
If Cora was honest with herself, she’d always really wanted children, hadn’t she?
It just hadn’t happened for her.
Well, not in a traditional way, at least.
Cora positioned “Tomorrow” sheet music atop her piano and splayed her hands tenderly across the keys. Her mother had gifted her weekly lessons throughout her youth, but her passion for the keys had faltered as she’d launched into singing, theater, and dance. For one tear-filled year, she’d studied theater at Boston University, but she had missed the Vineyard (and Victor) so desperately that she’d returned. When Victor had asked if she regretted her departure from school, Cora had nearly laughed. “I never think about it,” she’d told him. “I only think about the life we’ve built here together. And the fact that we’re able to share the stage together, side-by-side, year after year. Maybe if I’d been an actress in New York City, I would have had one or two okay-ish roles before giving up for good. And who knows. By then, you might have found a far better wife to call your own.”
At this, Victor had scoffed and said, “As if. Now, you’re talking nonsense.”
Cora spent the next few days practicing for her audition. She now felt like a well-oiled machine, with a real purpose to get up in the morning.
On Friday, January 7th, Cora arrived at the audition fifteen minutes before four and sat in the parking lot doing breathing exercises until the auditorium door was unlocked. As she inhaled, exhaled, inhaled, exhaled, she watched as several previous cast members stepped out of their vehicles and headed for the door. They looked nervous with excitement. There was Harold, a man in his fifties who’d frequently drank Manhattans with Cora and Victor back at their place after rehearsal. There was Francesca, a woman in her late thirties who’d taken on several important roles over the past years of community theater, including once playing Victor and Cora’s daughter in a production. This had been a remarkable time for Cora and Victor, as they’d taken the opportunity to grow closer to Francesca and treat her like an “adopted daughter.” Francesca had been overjoyed with their friendship, but she’d slowly drifted away over the years, especially as she started a family of her own.
Cora gathered her materials and walked down the long sidewalk that led into the auditorium. Once inside, memories assaulted her in all directions— scenes that she hadn’t considered in many years, scents and smells that made her head ring with Victor’s voice, along with sights that reminded her of countless other roles, countless other memorized lines. She staggered forward before straightening herself, not wanting to be seen as the crazy woman she knew she could become if she wasn’t careful. Lonely widows were apt to fall through the cracks.
A young woman with Sheridan features greeted her warmly and handed her a pamphlet, on which was listed the order of people auditioning. The young woman began to describe the process, but Cora nodded almost immediately and said, “This isn’t my first rodeo.” The young woman laughed graciously and extended her arm toward the auditorium. “Then take a seat. We’ll get started very soon.”
At three minutes past four, Lola Sheridan, along with the young woman who’d handed out the pamphlets, and another young woman with similar features (all this dark hair, ocean-blue eyes, slender figures— the family seemed taken from a catalogue), stepped up on stage to greet everyone who was ready to audition. Lola Sheridan seemed nervous, swapping her weight from leg to leg.
“Thank you for coming here today,” Lola greeted them. “I trust that many of you have auditioned before. For the rest of you, the process goes like this. You’ll hand off your music to Rhonda, our gracious and talented pianist, and then tell us what you’re auditioning for, then perform a little tune. If we like what we see here today, we’ll call you in for line-reading over the weekend. We hope to announce all parts by Sunday so that we can dig into this beautiful, fun, and upbeat musical by this Monday afternoon.”
Cora was listed as twelfth in line to audition. This gave her plenty of time to have a full-on freak-out as others jumped on-stage to perform. Her old friend, Harold, sped up midway through his performance so that the pianist was left chasing after him as he barreled toward the end. Francesca sang quite sweetly, tenderly, but her eyes were glassy with fear. Three high schoolers walked on stage, one after another, and introduced themselves as Gail, Abby, and Rachel. All had no idea who they wanted to play in the musical. “Just one of the orphans, I guess,” the last one said.
Two little girls auditioned for Annie prior to Cora’s audition. One of them was eight years old with curly black hair and a big gap in her front teeth. She tap-danced across the stage joyfully, nearly flying through the air, flailing her arms. Her voice was less-than-stellar and wavered nervously between lines. When she got off the stage, her mother scolded her, grabbed her hand, and dragged her back into the hallway. Cora rolled her eyes with disdain. Some parents didn’t know what a beautiful life they’d been given. They couldn’t comprehend the weight every one of their actions and words had on the blossoming child before them.
Up on stage, Cora delivered the sheet music to Rhonda with a wink. Rhonda’s jaw dropped with surprise. She hissed, “Someone told me you weren’t coming back this year!”
Cora’s smile was electric. There was something about stepping out on stage, especially after nearly a year away. Her body was light and airy, her smile eager and easy, and her posture pin-straight yet not militant. She felt glorious and feminine and ready to take on anything. She could have performed a one-woman show at that moment, given the time.
“Good afternoon, Cora,” Lola Sheridan began from the dark seats below. “What will you be auditioning for today?”
Cora’s voice was unrecognizable, at least to herself. It was musical and easy.
“I’ll be auditioning today for the part of Miss Hannigan,” Cora replied gently, realizing, now, that she wanted to create a contrast between her own personality and that of the character.
“All right. We’re ready for you,” Lola replied with a firm nod.
With that, Rhonda burst into “Little Girls,” a Miss Hannigan lament that illustrated her raucous anger toward the little girls at the orphanage along with her alcoholism and her general greediness.
“Little girls. Little girls. Everywhere I turn, I can see them...” Cora began, scrunching her face, building angst. Her voice became guttural and feminine as she grew louder, strutting across the stage. “I’d have cracked years ago if it weren’t for my sense of humor...”
Cora’s performance drew her out of herself. It tore back the years and allowed her to feel thirty, thirty-five— during the years when she and Victor had been the king and queen of that very stage. And when, three and a half minutes later, she found herself at the edge of the song, her throat aching and her eyes alight, she gasped with immense pleasure and nearly crumpled into tears.
“Bravo!” Lola and the rest of the crowd waiting for their auditions howled. “Bravo!”
Cora gave a gentle bow and then hustled out of the auditorium, suddenly sizzling with fear. Once outside in the frigid air, she placed her hand on the stone wall of the auditorium and lifted her chin toward the impenetrable blue sky. She’d forgotten her coat and her sheet music, but none of it mattered— not at this moment. For now, after nearly a year of no music at all, she finally felt alive.